5 Tips for a Successful Virtual Mentorship Program

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Do you have a program in your workplace that is designed to help a certain group of workers? These workers are expected to meet virtually and help each other. You can even provide an experienced person to help them.

Or is it a mentoring group you have created at the office where you meet online every month to discuss things affecting your performance? You might tailor these meetings in a way that is supposed to help each one of you achieve their goals.

Whatever it is, these are all virtual mentorship programs. For them to be successful, follow the tips discussed in this article.

1. Get Prepared On Time

One of the most important things is to make sure that you are always prepared even before the virtual mentorship meeting starts. Just like any other meeting, preparation will play an important role in dictating whether your mentorship program will be successful or not.

If you are the mentee, ensure that you have created and sent an agenda before every meeting to your mentor. This gives your mentor enough time to prepare what they will talk to you about, and to make sure that it covers the topics that you are interested in.

This way, you will both know what to cover during the session. This is similar to a person who wants to host a webinar. They will need a successful webinar promotion that tells audiences what the webinar will cover. Some people might decline to attend your webinar just because they cannot see the topics that will be covered.

2. Use the Right Platform(s)

You should also agree on the right platform to use. The truth is that you can find hundreds of meeting platforms to use, but always choose one that supports password protection. Or use a mentoring focused platform such as PushFar, which helps organisations implement, scale and track their mentoring programs.

Before you start the meeting, test your connection and make sure that it works well. You also need to check the camera and sound to avoid issues that might disrupt you in the middle of the meeting. Your picture should be captured in the middle of the screen.

You should also test your lighting and find the best place to sit during the meeting. Try as much as you can to avoid outdoors or places with a lot of background noise and choose a place where you can talk about sensitive and confidential topics.

3. Understand Your Roles

In a mentorship program, whether in-person or virtual, you will either be a mentor or a mentee. Do you know your roles as well as those of the other person? This is something you need to keep at your fingertips.

If you are the mentee, you are supposed to learn from the mentor. If you are the mentor, you will be tasked with making sure that the entire process is smooth. You should also dictate the entire process and structure the mentoring meetings.

However, you will be expected to discuss with the mentor (if you are the mentee) or the mentee (if you are the mentor) what each one of you expects from the other. Things like who sets up meetings should never come up in a virtual mentorship program.

4. Set Smart Goals and Connect Often

Chances are that you have heard about SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-Sensitive goals). This is exactly what you need for your virtual mentorship program to be successful. It is also the only way for everyone to understand the path to follow.

In addition, make sure that all your mentoring sessions and activities are geared toward achieving the goals you have set. During the mentorship sessions, check the goals you have set and see if you have achieved any of them.

You should also make sure that you are accessible and can connect as often as you would like to. For this to work, you can create a schedule that works well for all parties for a convenient and regular connection.

5. Give and Ask For Feedback

If you are the mentor, you understand that you should provide guidance and advice to the mentee. Even though you might want to hide some facts, you should always make sure that you have provided honest feedback.

You should also ask your mentee what they think about you and your performance as a mentor. Find out if they are finding you helpful as a mentor and if they think that there is anything you can do to improve how you mentor them.

Virtual mentorship programs are going to keep on growing in popularity. However, if you do not follow the tips discussed in this article, the chances of the programs being successful will be very minimal.

This article was guest written by Jessica Perkins.